


1000 Years Left

by citrusfriend



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Descent into Madness, Dissociation, Fantastic Racism, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Internalized racism, Jotunn Loki (Marvel), Loki falling through the Void, Missing Scene, Odin (Marvel)'s Bad Parenting, Psychological Trauma, Suicidal Loki, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, The Void, not necessarily frigga friendly, thor neutral
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-15
Updated: 2018-09-15
Packaged: 2019-07-12 12:58:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15995705
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/citrusfriend/pseuds/citrusfriend
Summary: Loki did not know how long he had been falling, but it was long enough that he had finally ceased his hysterics and fallen numb. If it weren’t for the constant pushing and twisting of the fall, he might have even been able to fall asleep. With his magic somehow bound and out of reach in the Void, he had nothing to do but wait, so he mentally resigned himself to falling for the rest of his miserable, monstrous existence.[Or, what happened in the Void?]





	1000 Years Left

**Author's Note:**

> Look so I was taking a shit and was like "bro what if Jotuns don't live as long as Aesirs do and that's part of why Loki freaked" and I kinda veered from that here bc my muse came out to play, but hey. Look at that.  
> Also, in case y'all ignored the tags, there is so much talk of suicide. Like. 90% of this is Loki thinking about when he'll finally die. Please don't read this if this will trigger you. Purposely triggering yourself never goes well and you deserve better. Don't punish yourself on purpose.  
> But if this won't trigger you and pain is what you want, then read on bb

Loki did not know how long he had been falling, but it was long enough that he had finally ceased his hysterics and fallen numb. If it weren’t for the constant pushing and twisting of the fall, he might have even been able to fall asleep. With his magic somehow bound and out of reach in the Void, he had nothing to do but wait, so he mentally resigned himself to falling for the rest of his miserable, monstrous existence.

And that was when he realized it. The epiphany felt like a physical blow and his choked gasp went unheard in the dark expanse of space.

He was going to die soon.

And no, it wasn’t even his inevitable demise from the Void, which he had intended when he let go, though he was hoping for something more instantaneous than this burning eternity. No, this was from the secret his _‘father’_ elected to keep from him.

Jotuns do not live as long as the Aesir do. Loki had always known this, but with his preoccupation that he truly was a monster like they had all been whispering just in his hearing range, he hadn’t made the connection. Jotuns who live to be in their 3000s are considered lucky, while the majority of Aesir live to be 8000. Which means...

As a mage, Loki also knew that his lifespan was more tenuous than others’, as many spells can take years from the spellcaster’s life. But he was careful. He knew he was important to Asgard, even if he often resented the role, so he never cast such a spell without something else--a charm, or potion, or other magical trinkets--to return the years to him. Loki was _careful_.

And he was going to die early anyway.

Once the despair from yet _another_ thing being stolen from him faded, he pushed away the overhanging mental fog from the Void to consider the ramifications. It wasn’t the idea of dying early that nagged him, Loki decided as his body slowly twisted in his slow descent. It was that he likely would have never known.

Loki could have lived his whole life in ignorance. He _would have_ lived his whole life in ignorance. Loki was a schemer and without the _disaster_ that the days Before The Void had been, he would have created plans which he would have never been able to complete. Without the mess after what would have been Thor’s coronation, Loki likely would have continued on with his bitter, yet resigned outlook on life and _wanted_ to live those extra years. He would have looked forward to and counted on the years that Loki now wishes he didn’t have to suffer through. Although, this would have only come to be if Odin’s blasted plan was never enacted, but the other option of ruling Jotunheim was hardly more desirable.

1000 years left to live. A part of him, the part which had become painfully strained by his fath- by _Odin’s_ betrayal, and now was cracking in the void, thought the plan quite clever. After all, 1000 years would give enough time for Thor to situate himself on the throne, for Odin to manipulate Loki onto the Jotun throne, to establish relations with the Jotun people. By the time Loki would have any real power in Jotunheim, he would be close to dying, and Odin would be able to place a _proper_ puppet king in his place. And the odds of Loki finding a way to counteract such a thing would be slim, he knew, simply because he would be left floundering in his new reality.

1000 years left to live. Another part of him, the part of him that let go of the bridge, decided this beneficial. After all, this is 5000 years that he won’t have to spend spiralling aimlessly through an abyss. The Void still held his seidr out of his reach and he was disarmed; he was not be able to end his life manually. Although, even without the Void’s interference, Loki wasn’t confident that he would be able to wield his magic regardless. He was a mage; he had to possess a strong sense of self. Many mages lost themselves to the flow of seidr and Yggdrasil without a solid grasp on their identity, and shapeshifting and illusion-casting only exacerbated that necessity. If one was not secure in themself, they would lose themself in whatever form or illusion they were intending to create. However, his mother--could he truly call her that? She had to have known _something,_ was she manipulating him the entire time?!--had taught him well and he meditated often--something else Mother had taught him, but even if his species was unknown to her, she knew he was adopted and she knew discovering such a thing so late in his seidr development could kill him, she _knew_ \--to maintain his sense of self.

Now, however, Loki’s existence had been revealed to be a lie. His body, his physiology, his heritage, his lifespan, his people, his culture, even his magic. And now, his perception of himself and those dearest to him has been twisted into something unrecognizable or comprehensible, even to him. He had felt it during his brief rule, had felt the way his seidr twisted and screeched in his veins--does he even have veins? Why does he know nothing of the Jotuns?--and it had only worsened his burning desperation. Perhaps it was best that the Void was separating himself and his seidr. No matter how inconvenient and delayed his death would be, and no matter how disconcerting and inherently _wrong_ it felt to be without his abilities, that discomfort would be better than feeling his magic tear it’s way through his body. Though, even _that_ would kill him faster than this slow descent.

It would be horrifically ironic for the fourth most powerful mage in the Nine Realms to have his own magic turn on him. To have Thor’s foolish brother fall victim to his own tricks. For Loki to die because of his only source of pride.

But Loki could wait. He had spent his entire 2091 years--perhaps he was older now? It felt like he had been falling long enough that he may be older, but time was strange here--waiting for his parents’-- _adopted_ _parents--_ approval. He would count the distant stars and let the fog consume his once-sharp mind--he had thought more clearly than this Before, hadn’t he?--and let himself fall. It was likely he would become mad in the process, but nothing but death was waiting for him now, so it mattered not.

Yes, he would wait for death, he thought, closing his eyes as his mind slipped back into that specific state of numb and he fell.

\-----------

The almost-stinging cold of space had seeped into his bones back when he still had a grasp on time, but now he wondered if heat had been a hallucination from his past life. Or if his past life had all been a hallucination.

Distantly, his mind recalled a place called Muspelheim, a place that was so hot that it had given all of them--who was ‘all of them’? There was no one else in the Void--burns that they couldn’t instantaneously heal, but Loki dismissed the notion of it. Such a place was not possible. In that same memory, however, he saw someone… Thor, yes, his brother-not-brother, sling his arm around Loki’s shoulders fondly, and Loki knew for certain that this vision was nothing but his imagination.

Touch is not for someone like Loki and such things cannot happen in the Void.

From the same place in his consciousness that the memories emerged, a voice whispered that they had not been in the Void during the memory, that Loki had not always been falling, and he frowned.

Existing out of the Void. How could such a thing be possible? Being warm, being touched… No. Loki pushed those thoughts away in favor of embracing the ever-present fog. He couldn’t fantasize of anything being different. Loki only had 1000 years left. The Void would kill him soon, so things like skin contact and heat and family were irrelevant. 1000 years left. He would die soon. He would die soon. He had to die soon. He had to die soon, he had to, he had-

_Oof._

His lax body slammed into… into something and his face twisted. It had been so long since he had felt something else in the Void and the sensation felt foreign and wrong and painful and-

He heard a noise through the ringing in his ears, but it had been so long since he had heard anything that he couldn’t comprehend what it was. The panic spread through his body faster than the pain did, and the combination thoroughly drove away the blissful fog in favor of unadulterated terror.

 _No. No._ Loki was supposed to die, he was supposed to die, the Void was going to kill him, he only had 1000 years left before he was gone, only 1000 years left, _please,_ he _just wants to die, let me die already, I can’t, only 1000 years, I need to die-_

He hadn’t realised that he had been moved or that he was speaking out loud until he heard a low laugh.

“I’m afraid there will be no dying for you, little prince.”

And then there was _pain, so much pain, please, why I can’t stop please just kill me stop-!_

In the brief moments of respite, he reminded himself of the only thing he could remember.

_1000 years left._

_1000 years left._

_1000 years left._

_1000 years left._

**Author's Note:**

> So I was trying to make it pretty clear that as time goes on, Loki is becoming more unstable, but that might have fucked up Loki's voice and made a shitload of run-on sentences so uhhhhhhhhhhhh  
> Also, I was initially just gonna write the realisation and then him hitting Thanos' ship, but then I was editing and I shitted a bit on Frigga and I had to explain why he didn't use magic to kill himself and then I just kinda added a bit of torture bc I love pain  
> Also, since Loki was existing in a state of complete sensory deprivation (sound doesn't travel in space) the torture from the Other would be a hell of a lot worse, so I tried to emphasis that?  
> Also it was surprisingly hard to not have Loki say 'god'? I hadn't realized how much I use it until now rip


End file.
